With the passage of the Senate version of immigration reform we have some details to ponder.

Illegals who become “provisional” for up to 13 years will not qualify for some Obamacare credits and subsidies.

Workers who receive “unaffordable” insurance coverage from employers will be available for Obamacare subsidies, and the employer penalized up to $3,000. Provisional aliens would not be qualified for the subsidies, which could give provisionals up to a $3,000 cost advantage over U. S. workers.

Whether this was intended or just thoughtless drafting remains to be seen.

And of course, the Senate bill is just a starting point in a long hot political debate, so this may become nothing at all.

Comments (3)

Chad Brick

June 30, 2013 4:13 pm

Legal immigrants have to prove that they or their sponsor can support them while they are in the US. Thus, while they technically are able to apply for welfare benefits, EITC, etc, they often don’t qualify. Those granted amnesty do not face this financial hurdle and will often qualify for these types of programs and credits, unless the law explicitly forbids it.

No, former illegals on the amnesty path should not be able to collect ANY subsidy from the government – no welfare, no Medicaid, no EITC, no health care subsidies. They are already getting a sweetheart deal that is easier than the deal legal immigrants get. If they don’t like it, they can always leave.

Spring Texan

June 30, 2013 9:30 pm

Chad Brick, they are mostly people who have worked hard and paid taxes and deserve the benefits thereof. I think “second-class citizens” are a terrible idea in any country, although yes castes have existed and different sets of rules in many countries and times — but not a good idea.

Have a heart and some conscience.

Chad Brick

July 1, 2013 8:18 am

They are first-class citizens – wherever they came from. If they don’t like the rules here, they are welcome to leave at any time.

Legal immigrants also play by the rules and work hard and pay their taxes. And of course, they have to prove that they will have income or support before they are given a visa. Why should they have to wait outside the country for as long as decades before getting the chance to come here and work hard, while the illegals walk right in? Why should the majority of legals (those with family-based visas) have to endure 4-5 months of forced unemployment after they arrive, waiting for their work permit to be processed? I can guarantee the illegals didn’t wait. Why should the legals have to spend thousands, and sometimes tens of thousands of dollars, dealing with all sorts of pointless USCIS edicts, when the illegals just ignored them?

We should double legal immigration and remove most of the USCIS nonsense, while hammering illegals and anyone who knowingly hires them. No IDs, no work, no bank accounts, no driver’s license, and automatic deportation if caught by any officer of the law in the country.

If you say that is too harsh, it’s basically the law in the country where I happen to have immigrated, and the law which I obey. Immigrating to Japan is a cakewalk if you follow the rules, and hell if you don’t. Hence their estimated 30:1 ratio of legal immigrants to illegal ones. You try to leave Japan one day after your visa expires? You will be arrested at the airport, stripped searched, and jailed. Then deported at your own expense, or if you can’t pay for it, whichever company or individual who sponsored your visa will be forced to fork over enough cash to deport your heiney. On the other hand, if you follow the rules, costs are about a fifth of USCIS, processing times are half as long, the forms are easier to the point where you would virtually never need a lawyer, and unlike green-card holders in the US, Japanese permanent residents are pretty much free to live both inside and outside of Japan as long as they pay taxes appropriately.

Every illegal we let in roughly corresponds to one less legal immigrant we tolerate. There is a limit to how much immigration we can handle, both practically and temperamentally. I do have a conscious, and my conscious places those that follow the rules ahead of those that broke them.